Newly translated from the Latin.
I did not want this booklet to perish under moth and mildew, since I consider it worthy of being read even today by us who are preachers of the church. Above all, I like the extremely free confession of misery. Although the author does not speak Latin well, he nevertheless, like a kind of Cato, presents the matter himself without ornamentation and accurately. And I am very much surprised that at that time someone had the audacity to publicly call the bishops devils and tyrants of the priests. He was certainly one of those whom the Lord forgave the sins of idolatry and preserved them wonderfully in this ruin of the Antichrist. For he makes Christ the example of the pastors or (as he calls them) curators, and the office and cross of the pastors.
who among Christians does not recognize that this was a kind of spark or (as Christ says) a smoldering wick of true godliness and knowledge of God in such a troubled, humble and patient soul? Such people belonged to the church under the papacy. Although they were not without infirmities, sins and errors, they looked up to Christ, sighed and cried out to Him, as if they were people who were already drowning, while the other clerics (as they are called) served the devil, yes, were devils of the churches. Thus, the church has been preserved by the pastors and schoolmasters, who have been forced to teach the Word and administer the sacraments, even though they did not live without infirmities and did other things, since they were oppressed by the Antichrist and his rulers.
2) The book to which Luther wrote this preface is entitled: Epistola de Miseria, Curatorum seu Ple- banorum, aeditus [sic] anno 1489. Cum Praefatione D. Mart. Luth. Vittembergae 1540. at the end: Impressum WittemderMe per Xieoluum KeUirleutL, anuo 1540. octav. The preface is found in Latin in des Buddeus Kupplemkutum Lpistolarum ImtUeri, p. 330 and in the Erlanger Ausgabe, opp. var. ur^., tom. VII, p. 554. German in the Leipzig edition, vol. XXII, appendix, p. 131 and in Walch. In the "innocent news" 1702, p. 90 the writing is placed in the year 1439